Gabe was not happy to be heading for the bakery at 4.30 in the morning, but Nick, who’d finally stopped sulking after the failed temptations of Violet Cattermole and Lorelei Dove, was determined that they would go together.

“Come on, bro,” Nick cajoled. “It’ll be interesting!”

“The only thing that interests me about baking is eating the result. How do you know that he starts so early anyway?”

“It’s all in Nigel’s profiles, which you would know if you bothered to read them. Perkins wakes very early without the aid of an alarm clock and leaves his warm double bed without waking his wife, who doesn’t rise until four hours later. He tiptoes downstairs in his dressing gown, and into the kitchen, where the only sound is a loudly ticking clock. Laid out for him by Gwen the night before are his work clothes, a large, clean white apron, and a mug with a spoonful of instant coffee and two spoonfuls of sugar in it. Then he gets dressed while the-”

“Well, he hasn’t done a bad job, but, no, he could hardly know all the really intimate details. So I’ve checked them out for myself.”

“You mean you’ve been spying?”

Nick tutted at that but ignored the question and carried on speaking. “Where was I? Oh yes. Perkins gets dressed while the kettle boils, and carries his mug of tea through to the bakery ready to start on the dot of 5 o’clock. By the time the ovens have reached the correct temperature, the tea is drunk and the ingredients for the various batches of bread and rolls, some of which have been left to rise overnight, are spread about the worktops, as well as whatever he needs for that day’s cakes.”

“That’s all very fine, but as I’ve already said, as much as I love bread and cakes – particularly cakes – I have no wish to stand in a hot kitchen watching them get made. And what will Glen Perkins think, us just turning up unannounced and interrupting his work?”

“He won’t mind, Gabe. And if he does, it’ll be very easy to make him unmind.”

“I still can’t see why you’re so keen to do this and why you have to drag me along.”

Ignoring Gabe’s remark again, Nick chattily passed on more information about the baker, “Our man Perkins used to sell high-spec kitchen equipment all over Europe. He and Gwen had a very fine house in Richmond, where Debbie was born. He made good money because he was good at his job, but when the company hit hard times, he took voluntary redundancy and used the money and his savings to return to the place of his and Gwen’s birth and buy this little place. He’d had a dream of having his own bakery ever since his mother had shown him how to make sourdough bread when he was eight or thereabouts.”

“Really?” said Gabe, brightening up as he loved to hear nice stories about people and, anyway, he couldn’t hold a bad mood for long.

“Yes. And his wife, the magnificent Gwen, had been more than happy to move back to the village as well, thinking it would be a better place to raise their delightful young daughter. Ah, here we are.” Nick peered through the darkened window of the bakery. “There’s light at the back, let’s go round.”

They went down a narrow alley and through the wooden gate that led into the Perkins’ tiny garden. The gate creaked on its hinges and Nick cursed as a big ginger tomcat yowled as it darted between his legs. The back door opened a crack, spilling light onto the dark lawn, and Glen called out, “Is someone there?”

Nick replied, “Good morning, Mr Perkins. I hope you don’t mind me calling round, but you did say that I could watch you bake if I could ever get myself up in time. Well, this morning I awoke particularly early and I thought, aha, today is the day to take Mr. Perkins up on his word, and my brother decided to come along too!”

Gabe could see that Glen Perkins was struggling to remember promising any such thing to anyone, but he stood back to allow them both into his kitchen.

Nick stepped over the threshold ahead of Gabe, and rubbing his hands in anticipation, said, “I’m really excited about this, you know!”

Glen watched in bewildered silence as Nick walked over to where the ingredients and tins were laid out, studying them for a bit and then turning to the two large ovens, which were working themselves up to temperature. Gabe heard a strangled cry come from Glen’s throat when Nick opened the door to one of the ovens, and stuck his head right in.

“Fascinating!” echoed back at them, then Nick withdrew his head, closed the oven door and turned to Glen, his beaming face scarlet from the intense heat, and trilled, “Let’s get started then, shall we?”

Glen Perkins merely nodded, cleared his throat, and then, like a man in a trance, launched into an explanation of what he was about to do. “It gets pretty messy in here, what with the flour getting everywhere, so may I suggest you wear an apron? You certainly don’t want flour or dough on your smart clothes, do you?”

He opened a small cupboard by the door that led into the café and took out two freshly laundered aprons.

Nick, more delighted than Gabe had seen him in a long time, shrugged off his leather jacket, hung it on a hook on the door, and donned the apron; Gabe more slowly followed suit. As Glen Perkins was more than twice the size of him and his brother, the aprons should have wrapped round them twice with room still to spare, but once he and Nick had tied theirs round their waists with neat bows, they seemed to have readjusted themselves to a perfect fit.

Gabe stood beside Nick and they watched in absorbed concentration as Glen worked with the risen dough, knocking and shaping loaves and rolls before putting them into tins and onto baking sheets. Some were wholemeal, some brown, some white, but all quite plain.

Nick broke the silence. “Have you ever thought of making something a little, um, more interesting?” he asked, once all the trays and tins had been slid into the ovens.

Glen set about cleaning the work surface of flour and sticky bits of dough so he could start on the cakes. “No, Mr. De Angelo, sadly there’s no call here for exotic breads. The villagers like their loaves and rolls plain; they wouldn’t buy bread with herbs and seeds in it.”

“Are you sure about that?”

Clearly a little irritated by Nick’s questioning of his expertise, Glen banged his bowls and utensils into the sink with too heavy a hand causing one to cracked and fall apart in two pieces. Glen said a very rude word before exclaiming, “That was my favourite mixing bowl. What a nuisance.”

“Oh, I’m sure it can be fixed,” cried Gabe. “Here, give the pieces to me. I promise you I’ll bring it back good as new.”

Behind Glen’s back, Nick rolled his eyes, then went on the attack again. “Well, now, Glen, I wonder if you’re right about the villagers not wanting fancy breads? I happen to know that Mrs. Capsby buys sundried tomato and green olive ciabatta from the bakery in Monkton Combe every Saturday, and Mrs. Fordingbridge buys cinnamon rolls there because Freddie loves them. The Reverend Hartley Cordwell is very fond of their walnut bread, so, you see…..”

Glen, paying attention now, handed the pieces of his mixing bowl to Gabe, and faced Nick, who casually informed him, “I also happen to know that that very bakery is closing down soon as the owners are retiring to the coast. The new buyers are going to turn it into a gift shop – which will fill the residents of Monkton Combe and Ham-Under-Lymfold and many other villages with despair. Think about it – where will Olive get her olive ciabatta and Freddie his sweet rolls then, hmm? Must the good vicar deliver his sermons without being fortified by walnut bread? Why make them go all the way into the city when they could get want they want right here?”

“Well, I-”

It slowly dawned on Gabe that Nick had just performed a Very Good Deed for Glen Perkins of his own volition, and that’s why he’d wanted Gabe there, to be a witness to it. He beamed at Nick to show his approval, and said to Glen, “My brother is right, Mr. Perkins. If they have to go into the city, they’d most likely buy all their bread there to make the effort worthwhile. But not if you start offering such things now. It’s worth thinking about, isn’t it?”

“And let’s not forget that the new restaurant will be in need of plentiful supplies of fancy breads. ”

“Good man!” said Nick, patting Glen on the shoulder. “You mull that over then, but in the meantime let’s do some cakes. We’re particularly fond of cakes, aren’t we, Gabe! In fact, I have a rather special recipe to share with you, if you’ve got some fine dark chocolate handy.”

***

Back at the mill, Gabe sat at the breakfast bar, carefully gluing the bits of Glen’s mixing bowl back together. “Feels good, doesn’t it, brother?”

“What?”

“You’ve just done something really kind by showing Glen Perkins the way to improve his business!”

Nick shrugged his shoulders and a sly look came into his eyes as he said with studied nonchalance, “How about we count it as an achievement for Charity, and leave Violet to her wonderful, nasty little ways?”

“Oh, Nick, is that why you did it? But there was no tempting, and Glen is already a good person so there was no change of any kind! You performed a straightforward act of beneficence and you should feel proud of yourself, but Violet is still your target.”

Nick shrugged. “Oh well, it was worth a try. And at least we’ll get some decent bread and cakes around here now.”

“Always an ulterior motive with you, isn’t there?” Gabe held up Glen’s bowl. “Good as new, with a little bit of glue and a touch of angel magic.”